Reservations and Information: (866)-263-2924www.inscenany.com
as part of the In Scena! Italian Theater Festival NY

6 maggio 2012

Spazio Mixo'
Via Fivizzano Roma (Pigneto)

Adapted from the internationally acclaimed play ROMAN NIGHTS comes this new 70 minute one-woman play that reveals many hidden sides to the great actress, Anna Magnani. Inspired by her extraordinary life and career, which was at times as tumultuous off screen as it was on screen, playwright Franco Dâ€™Alessandro has crafted a new work that explores the many dramatic, funny and touching aspects of Magnaniâ€™s illustrious career and fascinating life.

From her early, failed marriage to a director to her fiery affair with actor Massimo Serato (who sired her only child, Luca) to her passionate four year relationship with famed director Roberto Rossellini through her final parade of younger lovers, Anna Magnani battled to be equal in all aspects of her life â€“in the bedroom, on the stage and at the box-office. Arguably, one of her greatest battles was raising her son (who suffered from polio as a child) as a single mother in Catholic Italy, and fighting the courts to give him the last name â€œMagnani.â€ Whether demanding equal pay as her male lead in Rosselliniâ€™s â€œOpen Cityâ€ or battling for top billing over Marlon Brando in Europe everything in this OscarÂ® winnerâ€™s life was a battle. Most of all, she fought to stay true to herself and her art, which were inextricable because Magnani the actress was Anna the woman.

Dâ€™Alessandroâ€™s ROMAN NIGHTS (which examines the relationship between Tennessee Williams and Anna Magnani) has been translated into six languages and produced or performed in seven countries. After running New York City and London, the play is currently in its 6th sold-out year in Eastern Europe based in Prague, Czech Republic and it just recently opened in Buenos Aires, Argentina where it will run and eventually tour Chile for the next two years.

Acclaimed New York and Los Angeles stage director EVA MINEMAR directs award-winning actress LIDIA VITALE (â€œThe Best of Youthâ€ and â€œLâ€™Amore Proibitoâ€ ) in her American theatrical debut.

La Lupa Italian Cultural Arts Festival (LA LUPA FEST) is an event established to broaden the Los Angeles community by creating a festival that enriches and exposes diverse neighborhoods to Italian and Italian-American inspiration, passion, and culture of today. LA LUPA FEST is the first Italian Cultural Arts Festival of its kind in Los Angeles, celebrating Italian Culture and Art in a contemporary context, featuring established and emerging Italian and Italian American artists in Theatre, Film, Fine Art, Dance, Music, Poetry and the Culinary Arts.

Italian culture, for many years, has either been experienced in the context of the past and almost exclusively focusing on artists from the age of antiquity through the Renaissance.

What has long been missing from the Italian festival scene is a celebration of contemporary Italian and Italo-American artists from a variety of disciplines. A culture as marvelously vast, intricate and rich as ours (both native Italian and Italian-American) needs to be celebrated more often and in all its facets and complexities. LA LUPA FEST will feature poets, fiction writers, actors, musicians, filmmakers, singers, dancers, and fine artists.

LA LUPA FEST welcomes you to a celebration of art, music, dance, cinema, cuisine and theatre.